Thursday, June 22, 2017

Thursday Movie Picks - The Woods

Written as part of the weekly blogathon hosted by Wandering Through the Shelves. Join in the fun by picking three movies that fit the week's theme and writing a bit about them!
Growing up, our house didn't have a backyard. Our backyard was woods. It was really beautiful when it snowed - it looked like a real winter wonderland with all the ice and snow coating the branches of all the trees, and it was fun to go wandering and exploring. But during any other time of the year, it wasn't a place you wanted to go. It wasn't often scary-looking, but sometimes, when it was particularly dark and the cicadas and crickets and whatnot were particularly quiet, it made it tough to take the garbage out to the end of our driveway.

This week on Thursday Movie Picks, we're going into the woods, and.... well, there's one that immediately springs to mind, and the rest.... I REALLY had to stretch. Let's see how you think I did!

The Blair Witch Project (Daniel Myrick and Eduardo Sanchez, 1999) Somehow, my family went to see this on a movie outing. I was 15 and my sister was 13. When we returned home from the theater, it was dark out, and pulling in to the driveway, we realized it was garbage night. It took all four of us to bring out one garbage can, because this movie had instilled such fear about the woods and the dark. I know it is now in vogue to dismiss The Blair Witch Project as solely a marketing gimmick, and/or to blame it for all the terrible found-footage horror films it spawned, but this is the REAL DEAL, dealing in genuine terror - the terror of the unknown, of the darkness, of what is lurking just outside your field of vision. It boils down an entire genre to its most basic elements - three people, investigating a legendary witch, lost in the woods, where there are creepy sounds and strange goings-on - and lets our own psyches fill in the blanks. The final scene of this is still the cruelest, most bone-chilling denouement of any horror movie I've ever seen.

The Cabin in the Woods (Drew Goddard, 2012) It's nearly impossible to summarize Drew Goddard and Joss Whedon's horror spoof without giving away it's big secrets, which are best left to be experienced while watching the movie, but it's another movie that boils down the horror genre to base elements: five horny teens, an old, semi-abandoned cabin in the woods and off the grid, and the dark of night. That it actually manages to be as scary as it is funny is pretty impressive... to anyone who didn't watch Whedon's TV show Buffy the Vampire Slayer! The Cabin in the Woods is a total delight from start to finish, deconstructing the horror genre and satirizing it better, in a more serious and more loving way, than the Scary Movie series ever did.

Antichrist (Lars von Trier, 2009) You know what? I can't really in good conscience recommend this one. But GOD DAMN did it blow me away. The basic story is this: A nameless couple (Charlotte Gainsbourg and Willem Dafoe, both fantastic) are struggling after the death of their infant boy (he crawled out an open window while they were having sex in the shower). He is a therapist and she a scholar. After she becomes so grief-stricken she can barely move, he decides to take her to their woodland cabin, Eden, where he starts having terrifying visions and she starts exhibiting increasingly violent sadomasochistic tendencies. It terrible, ROUGH stuff, but cinematographer Anthony Dod Mantle has created some of the most beautiful images ever put on a screen for this, and the performances hold absolutely nothing back. It's a hyper-violent, super-pretentious movie, one that is quite possibly not for anyone at all, really. But as an exploration of grief and the masculine/feminine dynamic, it's quite stunning, and totally singular. Just don't say I didn't warn you.

19 comments:

I also chose The Cabin in the Woods. I love that movie so much. Blair Witch wasn't bad, but the ending disappointed me. I hated AntiChrist so much. I can't believe I paid to watch that movie, I hate myself for that. lol

I am SO of two minds about Antichrist, because it almost unbelievably misogynist and incredibly difficult to sit through (I don't do well with graphic violence). But GODDAMN is it beautifully shot, and so compelling.

Uh-oh I hate to admit it but I've seen none of these, not even Blair Witch! I know, I know EVERYBODY saw that movie but I'm not a horror guy and several people told me it was cheesy so I gave it the skip. The other two don't really sound like my thing but fit well.

My first came to me right away too and then I had to cast around a bit for my others.

The Emerald Forest (1985)-Engineer Bill Markham is in Brazil with his wife Jean (Meg Foster) and young son Tommy (the film’s director John Boorman’s son Charlie) working on a hydroelectric dam on the edge of the rainforest. One day while the three are having a picnic near the site Tommy is taken by a forest tribe known as The Invisible People. Markham spends the next ten years searching the jungles for Tommy meeting many obstacles including the cannibalistic Fierce People along the way. Beautiful looking complex adventure based on true events.

Sometimes a Great Notion (1970)-The Stamper family, father Henry (Henry Fonda), oldest son Hank (Paul Newman), his wife Viv (Lee Remick), younger brother Leeland and nephew Joe Ben (Michael Sarrazin & Richard Jaeckel) are independent Oregon loggers. When the local union loggers go on strike against the corporate giant that controls most of the area they urge the Stampers to join them but being struggling independents they fear they won’t survive and refuse. The tensions that run high among them and the townsfolk is mirrored within the family leading to conflict and tragedy. Based on a Ken Kesey novel this is a sometimes slow but extremely well-acted (Jaeckel is a particular standout) complicated family drama.

The Edge (1997)-Uber rich Charles Morse (Anthony Hopkins) has gone with his model wife Mickey (Elle Macpherson) on a photo shoot to a remote mountain area along with photographer Robert Green (Alec Baldwin), who Charles suspects is involved with Mickey, and his assistant (Harold Perrineau). While Mickey stays behind the three men fly into the wilderness for nature photos but the plane crashes killing the pilot and the three men must struggle to survive not only the elements but the giant bear tracking them through the woods and ultimately each other.

Blair Witch IS a horror film, but it's much more in the haunted house, things that go bump in the night mode as opposed to the violence and jump scares mode. If handheld cameras make you sick, I'd avoid it, but otherwise it's totally worth a watch.

Likewise, I've seen none of yours - and not even heard of the first two at all! They do sound good though, and the cast of Sometimes a Great Notion (what a TERRIBLE title!) is great! I heard mixed things about The Edge, so I never bothered.

I have not seen any of these. I remember when Blair Witch came out and I didn't like that shaky camera crap that became a fad for a while and was very irritating. Cabin is popular this week and I might give it a try. Antichrist sounds intriguing but I bet you either like it or hate it. The last scene make me wonder how the stars can do a sex scene when there are many people watching them. I also wonder how they can go through the motions without getting..um....excited:)

I cite Kick-Ass and Antichrist as two of the worst movies ever. Antichrist is reprehensible even more so than Kick-Ass. i don't often call movies misogynistic but boy is that one misogynistic as hell. Blair Witch however is one of the finest horror movies ever and I adore Cabin in the Woods as you said, perfect combo of funny and scary

Love all of these picks. I too saw The Blair Witch Project when I was 15 in the theater with my family. And yeah, doesn't matter what found footage films came after... if you saw The Blair Witch Project in the theater, it scared the shit out of you. It was so genuinely terrifying.

So, it sounds like we were all 15 when we went to the theater and saw Blair Witch...and had the exact same reaction. Certainly terrifying...and terrifying on re-watch as well. I did it a few years back, lights out, by myself. It worked. Very very well.

I have a lot of trouble with Von Trier. My last try was Nymphomaniac 2 (dug part 1), which I turned during the bit with the spoons. I know I should do Melancholia and Antichrist, but I just...I don't know.

Cabin in the Woods totally blew my me. Definitely need to check that one out.

I am HERE for all this Blair Witch love! Kevin, I'm totally going to have to watch it again to see if it still scares the shit out of me.

Melancholia is AMAZING. Antichrist, I have trouble recommending to people. Even if you like von Trier it can be problematic, so it may be best to stay away despite the great performances and WOW cinematography.

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Performer since birth, tap dancer since the age of 10. Life-long book-lover. Film obsessive. Frustrated artist since college graduation. Non-profit database specialist by day, tap teacher by night, Netflix binge-watcher by weekend.